1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to an improved data processing system, and specifically to a data processing system for managing device driver requests. Still more specifically, the present invention relates to a computer implemented method, an apparatus, and a computer usable program product for timing and tracking device driver requests.
2. Description of the Related Art
Device drivers track and manage requests independently of one another and in different ways. Typically, all device drivers assign a timestamp to each request. However, the time or the part of the process in which the device driver timestamp is assigned varies from driver to driver. For example, one device driver may assign a device driver timestamp as the number of ticks since the computer system was booted. Another device driver may assign a device driver timestamp as the number of seconds since a particular date. Another device driver may leave the device driver timestamp field blank altogether. As a result, difficulty arises when an error is detected in a computer system, and the need to identify where the error occurred in the process is important. The inconsistent device driver timestamps make the identification of the error difficult because of the difficulty in pinpointing the exact request which was being processed when the error arose.